Sometimes relationships don't last, and most of the relationships in Hollywood especially don't. While there are some celeb couples who have managed to stand the test of time, they are other celebrity couples that don't work out. Sometimes the more perfect they seem, the more doomed they actually are. Of course, you can never quite tell when a celebrity couple is going to break up but some are easier to spot than others. Even though Jenna Dewan had walked the red carpet without her famous hubby multiple times before their split was announced, most of us didn't even see it coming! Celebrities may try (and succeed) to come across a certain way to the general public but no relationship is perfect. Even if you know everything about a celebrity, there is no way you could understand the intricacies of their relationships.
There are circumstances where you can pretty much tell that at celeb relationship is doomed from the start. We can all spot a rebound a mile away — at least if it's someone else's rebound. Then there are some celebrities who are known for jumping into relationships quickly and you can tell that their newest one won't last longer than the others.
15 Didn't Expect: Channing And Jenna Stepped Down
Channing Tatum and Jenna Dewan fell in love on the set of Step Up, and according to Marie Claire, you can even watch their audition tape — which shows the two dancers vying for the roles that ended up bringing them together! Dewan told Us Weekly that at first Tatum wasn't ready to make a commitment; she told him simply, "You have to figure out what you want because I want a relationship."
Tatum said that he didn't think that he was ready for a relationship with Dewan but couldn't deny the connection; the two started dating and were married in 2009.
Though their relationship seemed perfect, Dewan told Health magazine that it definitely wasn't: "When people say, 'You guys have such a perfect life,' I want to scream and tell them, 'No one's perfect.' I think there are such things as great fits. It is a great fit as long as you are growing together, and I think up until this point we've really grown together. Even if one starts to grow, the other catches up and vice versa."
Even though the two of them were honest about their less-than-perfect marriage (and maybe because of their honesty) it seemed like they were going to be together forever. However, in early 2018, Tatum and Dewan announced their divorce with a statement that was surprising and sad, but ultimately uplifting: they had "lovingly chosen to separate as a couple" and while nothing about their love had changed, it was going to take them "on different paths."
14 Didn't Expect: Jen And Justin's Wanderlove
Ever since Brad Pitt left Jennifer Aniston in 2005, we've wanted her to find someone to make her happy. After a handful of not-so-perfect boyfriends, Aniston became romantic with Justin Theroux and it seemed like she was finally going to have her happy ending. Aniston and Theroux first started dating in 2010 after bumping into each other on the set of Wanderlust.
Aniston later told PopSugar that when she first met Theroux, she thought he was the "nicest person in the world." According to Us Magazine, by 2012, the couple was as happy as ever and Theroux told Extra, "I always go to bed thinking I'm the luckiest guy in the world." So sweet!
By the end of 2012, the two were engaged but didn't get married until three years later. Even after six years together, they had nothing but good things to say about each other. Theroux told The Times that he was "proud" of the way that she handles herself when it comes to the media and it was "an honor to stand behind her." Even in February of 2018, everything seemed good for the couple after Architectural Digest released a cover story. In the story, Jen said: "I look around at my husband and my dogs and our home, and there's nowhere else I want to be."
However, just a month later, the couple released a statement that announced their separation. According to apnews.com, they are "determined to maintain the deep respect and love" they had for each other.
13 Didn't Expect: Zayn And Gigi Won't Have Anymore Pillowtalk
Zayn Malik and Gigi Hadid have been on-again-off-again over the course of their relationship, but it was still hard to believe that they're now really over — at least, it seems that way. When the couple broke up, they actually confirmed the news via social media, which they hadn't done before. However, according to People, they have been spotted together recently looking very friendly.
When their relationship first started, the two had both just gotten out of relationships: Zayn had recently ended it with Perrie Edwards, and Gigi with Joe Jonas. According to Us Weekly, the two were definitely seeing each other but they weren't using “boyfriend and girlfriend” terms just yet.
It soon became clear that the two were together after Gigi appeared in Malik's music video for his song "Pillowtalk" and it was obvious that they had some serious chemistry.
After the couple went public about their relationship, there were plenty of rumors about them breaking up and getting back together. After their last breakup, it was rumored that Zayn and Gigi were actually engaged — after Gigi was spotted with a gold band around her ring finger and Zayn got a tattoo on his hand that read "love", according to E! Online. However, the engagement rumors were put to rest when the two announced that they were splitting up due to work conflicts. But will this breakup last?
12 Didn't Expect: Anderson And Benjamin's All Work And No Play
Anderson Cooper and Benjamin Maisani had been together for almost ten years before they shockingly announced their split. According to Daily Mail, Cooper and his longtime partner had separated "some time ago" but that they still "love each other very much" and "remain the best of friends". Recently, Cooper has been spotted spending time with a new man named Victor Lopez.
Cooper did not go into why the couple broke up, but according to past interviews with the two of them, we can start to piece together what may have gone wrong. According to an interview with People, Cooper said that he was a "workaholic" and Maisani would sometimes complain about how much time he spent traveling: “I think he’s annoyed that I travel so much but he also knows how much I like it. He’s kind of used to it,” Cooper said. “He’s never asked me not to go somewhere. He’s pretty understanding that the job requires travel, and he’s cool with that."
In an interview with French Morning, Maisani explained why he and Cooper were tight-lipped about their relationship, saying that he "never wanted to be a celebrity" and knew he would "have to be careful right from the start before it had a chance to get out of hand.”
11 Expected: Amber Heard And Elon Musk Were All About The Rebounds
The news of Amber Heard and Elon Musk dating was shocking but the news of their breakup was not. According to People, when the pair hooked up, Heard was newly divorced from Johnny Depp and Musk had recently filed for divorce from Talulah Riley (after already getting married and divorced, then married again).
Though the two seemed smitten with each other, there was the possibility that they were each other's rebounds after their respective divorces.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Musk had long been taken with Heard and sent emails to Robert Rodriguez back in 2013 asking to meet her because he wanted to get to know “interesting people from all different industries.” This was before Heard had gotten married to her Rum Diary co-star, and in-between marriages for Musk, but the two didn't meet until a few years later.
They first stepped out together for the first time in public in 2017 while Heard was filming Aquaman in Australia, as noted by People. The pair made headlines again when they both shared similar photos on social media of the two getting cozy together.
After breaking up temporarily and getting back together, the couple broke up for good due to their busy schedules. In a statement, Musk and Heard told People that it was the distance that had been "really tough" on their relationship but they have "the utmost respect for each other, and it would be troubling if anyone had the impression that we thought otherwise.
10 Not Expected: Lena Dunham And Jack Antonoff Weren't On The Same Page
Lena Dunham and Jack Antonoff were in a relationship for over five years, but it wasn't a complete surprise when they called it quits. For the past few years, according to The Cut, Dunham has gotten a lot of negative press due to her controversial and sometimes outright offensive tweets, opinions, and quotes. It's very possible that this heat from the media could have strained the relationship. However, Dunham said that she actually was surprised by the breakup, going to Twitter to reveal that she thought that they were heading toward an engagement after she heard him secretively talking to his and mentioning the word "finger". In reality, it seems they were talking about something unrelated.
According to E! News, “Jack and Lena were growing apart and it just made sense for them to end their relationship where it was. It was mutual.” However, it didn't seem so mutual when Dunham tweeted: “I thought Jack was furtively planning a proposal to me with his sister."
As noted by Daily Dot, there have been some rumors flying around that it was Antonoff's professional relationship with Lorde that had begun to get in the way of his relationship with Dunham. This is mostly due to the fact that Antonoff was spotted getting a little too friendly with Lorde in her hometown just a month after his public breakup with the Girls creator. However, according to Vogue, it seems more likely that Antonoff has moved on with model Carlotta Kohl and not the Royals singer.
9 Expected: David And Davidson
Pete Davidson and Cazzie David are only 24 years old (which is especially young for celebrity relationship standards) so it wasn't a big surprise when the two split up earlier this year. Davidson first started dating Larry David's daughter back in 2015, after he had broken up with Girl Code's Carly Aquilino.
David and Davidson got serious very quickly and the SNL star even got a self-portrait of his girlfriend tattooed on his forearm just a few months after they started dating.
In 2017, the couple was still going strong and Davidson gushed about her in an interview with ET: "She's the most beautiful girl in the world, look how lucky I am. She's so smart, look how smart she is. She is a very, very wonderful lady."
However, in February 2018, the two seemed to have gotten into an argument. According to Us Magazine, Davidson deleted all of the posts from his Instagram account and shared a photo of the two of them with the caption: “Idk what I did to make you hate me so much but I’m sorry.” A source later told Us Weekly the two weren't fighting and they hadn't broken up but "they were just joking as comedians tend to do.”
People reported that Davidson revealed on Complex's Open Late with Peter Rosenberg that he had broken up with Cazzie, saying that they were "not together anymore." Davidson didn't say much more than that but he did call his ex a "very talented girl" and that "she'll do great, she'll be fine."
8 Didn't Expect: Nikki And John Were Fighting For Each Other
Before John Cena and Nikki Bella started dating, they were friends yet Bella admitted that she was still flustered when he first asked her out:
"The first opening line was, 'Hey, do you want to go to dinner with me?' and I was kind of like, 'What? With me?' It just kind of started out like a dinner date and I have to admit we were friends for so many years, but then when you make it romantic, I couldn't even say a word to him."
According to People, when the two started getting series, Bella had to sign a 75-page contract which stipulated that she would have to vacate his home if they split up!
The two had plenty of struggles in their relationship which were shown on the reality show Total Divas including Bella's hope of getting married and starting a family which Cena was not completely on board for. After going back and forth about kids and marriage, Cena finally proposed in 2017 during WrestleMania 33. However, they called off their engagement a year later and Bella posted a statement on Instagram that explained that the "decision was a difficult one" and they still have a "great deal of love and respect for one another."
7 Didn't Expect: Colton Haynes And Jeff Leatham Were Burnt Out
Just a few months ago, Colton Haynes and Jeff Leatham were head-over-heels in love... but according to Us Magazine, they announced that they were filing for divorce after just six months of marriage. We don't know why the couple is splitting up but Haynes fueled cheating rumors when he posted a music video for his song "Man It Sucks".
“I don’t like when you’re staying out all night and never answer your phone, I follow you around the world just to be left alone, and man, it sucks,” Haynes sings. However, Haynes went to Twitter to set the record straight: "Jeff would never cheat. He's an amazing man. Please stop being mean to him. The song I wrote was about a past relationship."
Over the course of their engagement, Leatham was often featured on Haynes' Instagram; but right before they announced the split, Haynes had gone through and deleted every photo of his husband on his Instagram.
Rumors about the couple's possible breakup had already begun when the two first unfollowed each other on Instagram, according to Nicki Swift. Haynes removed "husband" from his bio and he changed his name from "Colton Haynes-Leatham" back to "Colton Haynes" According to Us Weekly: "Jeff and Colton have been having relationship issues since a couple months after the wedding. Since Colton stopped talking to a lot of his old friends, he was getting really depressed and didn't feel like himself."
6 Expected: Miranda Lambert And Anderson East Weren't Meant To Last
The news of Miranda Lambert and Blake Shelton's divorce was shocking, but the breakup between Lambert and her new boyfriend, Anderson East, wasn't nearly as surprising. The "king and queen of country" were together for 10 years before they got divorced, and while Shelton moved on with Gwen Stefani, Lambert has had her own romance with East.
People first reported that Lambert and East began seeing each other in December 2015. Anderson told the story of how they met:"Randomly enough, she came to one of my shows," he said. "A friend of hers introduced us."
That's right, country music brought them together and East even co-wrote two songs, according to Country Living, on Miranda's latest album. But country music could also tear them apart, as Lambert revealed at the "Front and Center" CMA Songwriter Series. She explained that the two lovebirds got into a fight while writing their first-ever song together, "Getaway Driver." But they got back together and seemed happier and stronger than ever.
E! News reveals that two country music stars had already talked about marriage and children, and that "Miranda's friends and family have never seen her this happy."
However, East gave an indication that things were about to go south when he told InStyle: "It's always difficult to be a traveling musician and still keep things together."
5 Expected: 21 Savage And Amber Rose Found Their Relationship Difficult
When Amber Rose and 21 Savage first started seeing each other, they were very vague about it. When 21 Savage went on Real 92.3 LA’s The Real After Party radio show in July 2017, he gave us a bit of insight: “We've just been kicking it, man, you know? She's a really cool woman. She treats me like a king, you know. It is what it is.”
Though things seemed to be going well between them, it looked like there was trouble when Amber stopped following 21 and deleted photos of him from her social media.
She later told The Shade Room they were still together and she unfollowed him by accident. Amber also claimed that she deleted the posts because the comments section was getting too heated — instead of just disabling the comment section.
Not long after Amber put the breakup rumors to rest, she went on the Big Boy's Neighborhood radio show and revealed that she and 21 were no longer together: “You know Big Boy, to be in a relationship, in general, is very difficult. To be famous and in a relationship is even more difficult. I love him. I really love him. I miss him. I think about him every day." She went on to say that her "heart is still with him" and that she hoped that they would be able to "work it out" one day.
4 Expected: Jesse Williams Was On The Rebound With Minka Kelly
Jesse Williams and Aryn Drake-Lee had a very private relationship — but their divorce was very public. Soon after it was announced that Williams and his wife of five years split up, the Grey's Anatomy star started dating Minka Kelly, according to People. The two had met while working on a video game and there were rumors that there was some infidelity on his part, which Kelly swiftly shut down in the comments of one of her Instagram posts.
Williams addressed the rumors himself in Jay-Z’s 4:44 video, Footnotes: “I was in a relationship 13 years, 13 real years, not five years, not seven years, 13 years. And all of a sudden [people] are writing think-pieces that I somehow threw a 13-year relationship — like the most painful experience I’ve had in my life, like with a person I’ve loved with all of my heart — that I threw a person and my family in the trash because a girl I work with is cute.”
Still, even if the rumors aren't true, the speculation from the public and the media is enough to strain any relationship. As Us Weekly revealed, the new couple said they were keeping things low-key but still going strong: “Jesse and Minka took a few steps back because of the publicity," an insider revealed. "But they are still seeing each other.”
However, after several months of dating, the couple called it quits, according to E!.
3 Didn't Expect: Ariana Grande And Mac Miller Weren't Right For Eachother
After Ariana Grande had a high-profile relationship with Big Sean, her next relationship wasn't high-profile at all. According to PopSugar, Ariana Grande and Mac Miller first started hanging out in 2013 after they recorded a duet for "Baby It's Cold Outside" and "The Way". It was clear they had chemistry, and Miller even showed up on Grande's 2015 tour to sing "The Way" with her. Though the two worked together on the remix of Grande's "Into You", they hadn't officially said if they were dating.
However, they sparked rumors when they were seen canoodling on a dinner date, according to PopSugar.
They eventually sat next to each other at the MTV Video Music Awards, became social media official, and fueled engagement rumors when Grande wore a diamond ring.
When asked about Grande in an interview with Billboard, Miller said that she's "amazing" before adding: "Just because we are two people who are in love and have a great relationship doesn't mean that I'm gonna get weird about this incredible music that we also make together. All I'm saying is, 'Yeah we're together, cool.'"
Even though it seemed that the two were going strong, TMZ reported that they broke up because of their busy work schedules but they still "love each other dearly." Grande is now said to be dating SNL's Pete Davidson.
2 Didn't Expect: Dominic Cooper And Ruth Negga Had A Ruthless Breakup
Before they broke up, Dominic Cooper and Ruth Negga kept their 8-year relationship very low-key. They also only had good things to say about each other. Negga opened up about longtime boyfriend affectionately for The Edit: “It would be so lonely if he wasn’t there," she said. "People say, ‘Never go out with an actor.’ But if you were with someone with a normal job and one of you had to go away, how would that work?"
Negga also went on to say that she dreamed of starting a family with her Preacher costar: “By the time you’re in a great relationship, it’s like, ‘Oh, I’m 35. Sh—t.’ So there is part of your thinking that is, ‘Do I want kids? When? If? How?’ It’s there, all the time, preoccupying me and that’s not being an actor, it’s being a woman. I don’t know what [job] really creates a safe space for a woman to have a timeout, prolong the human race and return to work in a very supportive way.”
The two first met first met while working on the play Phèdre for the National Theatre in London back in 2009. Though they each have high-profile projects under their respective belts, they managed to keep their relationship relatively private which was why it such a shock when they called it quits. An insider for Us Weekly revealed that the breakup "was totally amicable and they remain friends."
1 Didn't Expect: Nicki Minaj And Meek Mill's Very Public Breakup
Nicki Minaj and Meek Mill's relationship may have been tumultuous, but Minaj and Nas seemed to have a much more stable relationship. According to Billboard, the two first fueled dating rumors when Minaj posted a photo of herself with the rapper at his NYC restaurant. Nas also reposted the photo which only created more rumors.
When Minaj appeared on Ellen, she confirmed that the two had been spending time together but they weren't serious: "I'm just chillin' right now. I'm celibate. I wanted to go a year without dating any man. I hate men. I might make an exception to the rule for him because he's so dope."
After the two were spotted kissing in her Instagram Live video, it seemed clear that they were together.
Minaj then sparked pregnancy rumors when she tweeted a baby emoji in July 2017. However, no baby news emerged.
As told by E! News, "Nicki is not the type to date around. They are still getting to know each other." Minaj later posted two photos of Nas on her Instagram with no caption. Mysterious. On her birthday, Nas declared Minaj "The Queen" of both New York and Hip-Hop which made it seem like the two were going strong.
Us Weekly revealed that the two had broken up, "They were never in the same place at the same time," the source said. "So it was hard to move their relationship forward. They still remain friends.”
References: Marie Claire, Health Magazine, Us Weekly, Marie Claire, Us Magazine, Sunday Times, AP, People, Us Weekly, Insider, People, E! Online, Daily Mail, People, French Morning, People, The Hollywood Reporter, People, People, The Cut, Twitter, E! News, Daily Dot, Vogue, Us Magazine, People, Complex, The Huffington Post, Page Six, Us Magazine, YouTube, Us Magazine, Nicki Swift, Us Weekly, American Songwriter, People, 92.3 WCOL, Country Living, Tennessean, E! News, E! Online, InStyle, People, Complex, Complex, The Shade Room, People, People, Us Magazine, ET Online, PopSugar, PopSugar, PopSugar, Billboard, TMZ, The Edit, Us Weekly, Billboard, Hiphopdx, Us Weekly, People, USA Today
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